Flynn To Testify Against Trump: Gold, VIX Soar; Dollar, Stocks Dive

Ok, so in case there were any questions about whether Mike Flynn’s guilty plea was a pandora’s box, ABC reports that Flynn is now prepared to testify against Trump.

Specifically, Flynn is said to be willing to admit that Trump “directed him to make contact with Russian officials.”

FLYNN ADMITS MAR-A-LAGO CALL TO DISCUSS TALKS WITH AMBASSADOR

FLYNN HAS AGREED TO COOPERATE WITH PROSECUTORS IN RUSSIA PROBE

FLYNN HAD CONTACT WITH `SENIOR’ TRANSITION AIDE RE: AMBASSADOR

Needless to say, the dollar is diving:

Gold and the VIX are soaring:

Stocks are plunging and yields are falling with Treasury futures volumes surging as ~200k TYH8 trading over 5- minute period from 11:05am ET; 10Y futures drop through 2.36%, lower by up to 5.5bp on the day. At least 435 members of the S&P are in the red and the S&P 500 Advancers-Decliners index is at the lowest since August.

Statement from Dianne Feinstein

Washington—Senate Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) released the following statement on the guilty plea by former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn:

“Michael Flynn’s guilty plea is about more than just lying to the FBI. What he lied about and when he did it are of even greater significance.

“This shows a Trump associate negotiating with the Russians against U.S. policy and interests before Donald Trump took office and after it was announced that Russia had interfered in our election. That’s a stunning revelation and could be a violation of the Logan Act, which forbids unauthorized U.S. citizens from negotiating with a foreign power.

“It’s critical that we determine whether Flynn spoke with the Russians on his own initiative and who knew and approved of his actions. This is just one more proof point that these investigations must be allowed to continue without interference.”

The Logan Act states:

“Any citizen of the United States, wherever he may be, who, without authority of the United States, directly or indirectly commences or carries on any correspondence or intercourse with any foreign government or any officer or agent thereof, with intent to influence the measures or conduct of any foreign government or of any officer or agent thereof, in relation to any disputes or controversies with the United States, or to defeat the measures of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both.

“This section shall not abridge the right of a citizen to apply, himself or his agent, to any foreign government or the agents thereof for redress of any injury which he may have sustained from such government or any of its agents or subjects.”

At least we now know why Trump wanted Comey to lay off Flynn
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Dan Linden‏Verified account
@DanLinden
33m33 minutes ago
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Just now: @BrianRoss on @ABC News Special Report: Flynn promised full cooperation to the Mueller team and is prepared to testify that candidate Trump “directed him to make contact with the Russians.” http://abcn.ws/2ixWHDL

Interesting observation. I’ve taken a few “cheap shots” here and elsewhere suggesting that many of these fear episodes, blog sites, and this so-called “risk awareness” punditry may very well be an orchestrated effort in psy-ops to position retail investors to unload and hop out of assets at the wrong time to give institutional money an opportunity to grab those assets at lower prices.

I know – it sounds outrageous and out-right insane, but the interesting thing is that each time I have entered these they end up being deleted or never actually posted for some reason.

Fascinating, because I recognized how out-of-line that proposition may seem but at the same time don’t understand why anyone on the editorial side would want to censor it unless there is some truth to it. It’s not as if its offensive – just suggesting the obvious concept that these blog sites and the people behind them may not be what we think they are – and not our friends. All that said, I respect the idea of being risk aware, but I think there may be something more than meets the eye as to the motivations for providing us with all of this risk awareness. There’s that, and they get a revenue stream return on our clicks.

Anyway, interesting topic at a time when, clearly, sell-offs (such as they are) are obviously being used by institutional money to buy assets. The kind of volume we are seeing on the recoveries isn’t just Joe Dummie buying the VOO. I have a feeling that what we may be seeing is a concerted effort to frustrate Joe Dummie on a recurring basis, encouraging “him” to sell off periodically, hedge unnecessarily, and then the serious (or so-called fake) money is coming in and grabbing assets.

Who knows though? Maybe where “they” want all of us at the end of the day is in worthless cash, gold, CD’s, money markets, etc so they can help themselves to all of the productive assets. It would explain a lot.

you clearly have no conception of how big money moves in and out of asset classes.

the idea that some endowment or pension fund somewhere is in cahoots with a blogger and is trying to orchestrate a selloff in an entire asset class in order to get a better price is absolutely ridiculous.

I’ll add to the above, and I’ve said similar things to Heisenberg’s detractors before:
It seems to me that the incognito Mr. Heisenberg was (or is) paid for his risk assessment by some Wall St entity or the like. To think that Wall St doesn’t employ people to do just what he does here is naive. It’s obviously why he is incognito, because he’s giving us a peek into his thinking, which someone else somewhere pays for (plus I assume gives him the freedom to say things that he would otherwise censor for professional reasons).
The takeaway is: take him as your own personal risk-assessor, a lawyer who points out the downside. You are armed with a viewpoint you may not have had before; what you do with it is up to you.

Just testing though, and found this time the laughable narrative was not censored.

I will add, however, there’s a difference between calling one’s own narrative insane, absurd or laughable, and quite another to call those of others those names.

Who is buying the bonds and equities – effectively instantaneously and in huge numbers – that are sold off in sequence? Maybe Joe Dummie is in there for a piece, but the numbers and speed seem to me to be too extreme for it to be attributable to Joe.

There is a risk that, effectively, the SPX becomes the new currency and what we are witnessing is an epic exchange of old cash for the new cash.

The outcome will be whatever it is, and it will be interesting to pick apart the explanations in the aftermath. No doubt we have a greed factor here that’s palpable and fits in with every other late stage bull market. I’m just sensing something else and that is different here. I think the question has become whether one wants to hold cash, in one useless form or another, or hold a credit or equity claim on productive capacity?

If that’s not such an outrageous concept, then I suppose it’s possible that institutions could have come to the same conclusion and have a multidimensional tactical plan to grab the claims. I can name specific examples where this has occurred and is occurring. Institution A determines they want a piece of Enterprise X. Agent A is engaged to provide detrimental analysis to the market as to that Enterprise X – driving down its price and chasing out Joe Dummie who has not done his homework. This clears the way for Institution A to grab the assets.